> I am in complete agreement with you Chuck. Rather
> than the avant-garde that they claim to be, the WWP
> type groups are really an "arriere-garde" that suck
> the movement back into their hole. Unfortunately,
> there is no other way to expose them to the new forcse
> than to expose them over a period of time through
> debate. It is important not to allow them to
> dissimulate their politics behind the smokescreen of "
> we want to unite the most people", which as you know
> is just a way of saying that they (the wwp and other
> vanguardists) cannot unite with that Pof U and dont
> want to risk losing control of the movement by
> allowing it to pass.
> This "unite all" rhetoric sounds really good to the
> innocent. That is what really needs to be honed in on.
The problem with these groups is not that they are powerful, rather that they engage in disruptive behaviors and participate in recruitment campaigns that alienate young and new activists. In the latter department, the ISO is an especially noxious offender. It's like they have this revolving door where enthusiastic activists go in and bitter ex-activists come out.
The "lets unite" rhetoric has two chief functions. One is to eliminate any internal movement criticism, especially from those pesky anarchists. In a way, this rhetoric is exactly like that other famous phrase: "Let's unite behind the president." The other primary function is to convince new recruits that a "unified" movement is the best method to achieve the goals of the movement. This plays into the praxis of "democratic centralism," which seeks to create one mass party with the enlightened leadership cadre of _____ (insert ISO, IAC, or whoever) in charge.
> I agree with you that the vanguard element needs to be
> swept out of the way and especially in the current
> movement. Unfortunately each time there is a new
> cycle of struggle, the new forces will be made to
> suffer through the vanguardist's bullshit for a while
> until they too become hip to what's up. I wish there
> were a shortcut but there isn't.
Right. We're going through a reactionary phase where these vanguardist elements are exploiting the situation to play their old tricks. They understand that the anti-capitalist/anti-globalization movement is really a very anti-authoritarian, decentralized current of movements. networks, and tendencies, so there big hope right now is to use the "crisis" to get as many of those activists to rally behind their centralized movement.
The only way to challenge this behavior is for movement and activist veterans to speak up. We have to call them on their vanguardism. We have to challenge them at meetings. We have to make the nature of the anti-glob movement visible to those who never spent any time thinking about it. It's also important for us to continue with the projects and campaigns that we were working on prior to 9/11.
And don't buy their newspapers. ;-)
Chuck0